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Welcome to Super Secrets, a GOLF.com series in which we pick the brains of the game’s leading superintendents. By illuminating how course maintenance crews ply their trades, we’re hopeful we can not only give you a deeper appreciation for the important, innovative work they do but also provide you with maintenance tips that you can apply to your own little patch of paradise. Happy gardening!

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Watching grass grow is a serious snooze-fest.

But making grass grow? That’s edge-of-your-seat excitement.

The interest really ramps up in advance of elite tournaments, when golf courses work toward getting their rough long and thick and mean, like the juicy stuff we’re seeing at the U.S. Open at Winged Foot this week.

How do they do it?

One important step is to mow less often.

But that’s not all. Not even close.

GOLF.com asked Larry Napora, director of golf course operations at Firestone Country Club, a former World Golf Championship site, in Ohio, to share his recipe for making really tough rough.

1. Prep the grass in fall

Maintenance practices vary from one region to the next, according to such factors as climate, grass varieties, soil types and more. But all top-flight tournament setups require long-term planning. At Firestone, where the rough is a cool-season medley of bluegrass, rye and fescue, preparations for the late-summer WGC begin the previous fall. As autumn approaches, Napora and his crew make their rounds of the rough, looking for bare patches and any other areas in need of extra TLC.

“The goal is to get the grass well established before winter, so that it’s nice and lush and healthy when it comes back in the spring,” Napora says. Because grass seeds won’t take root if you simply spread them over dead turf, part of the job involves raking any dead patches clear so that seeds fall on friendly soil. But Napora and his crew don’t stop there. They also slit seed, using a machine that does exactly that: it cuts slices in the ground, dropping seeds into those slits as it goes.

This is beneficial for a couple of reasons. Not only do the seeds have a better chance of finding a healthy, happy home in the soil, but they also have less chance of being gobbled up by birds and other creatures that feast on seeds that have been scattered on the ground.

2. Juice the grass in spring

Come early April, as the weather warms and the grass reawakens, Napora and Co. get back at it, treating the grass with both fertilizer and weed control to prevent aggressive crabgrass from intruding. A month or so later: They deliver an application of insecticide. By now, the golf season is in full swing and the grass along the fairways should be hale and hearty but Napora doesn’t let it get overly long. Not for everyday play, anyway. He and his crew keep up their routine mowing. For everyday play, they keep the rough at 2 and a quarter inches. To maintain it at that height, they mow it twice a week.

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About six weeks before the tournament, they hand-water and fertilize around the banks of bunkers, because those areas tend to endure a lot of stress with foot traffic and other wear and tear. About three to four weeks before the tournament, the entire rough gets fertilized yet again. At that point, Napora says, it’s nice to get some rain, which helps kick the fertilized grass into overdrive. If no rain falls, Napora can always increase his irrigation. But, he says, “no matter how much water we throw down, there’s nothing better than mother nature’s water.”

3. Add the finishing touches

Come Sunday of the tournament, Napora says, the Tour wants the rough to be 5 to 6 inches tall. Working backward, that means he needs to have the rough at around 3 inches on the Saturday before the competition begins (though grass grows at different rates depending on the weather, among other factors, roughly one-fifth of an inch per day is a good rule of thumb). To get the grass to three inches, the crew simply stops mowing for a week.  

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To mow the rough, he and his crew use rotary mowers, not reel mowers, because rotary mowers prop up the grass as they cut, leaving the turf tall and proud. On the Wednesday before the tournament, the Tour inspects the rough one last time. If it has grown too quickly and needs a little trimming, Napora and his crew oblige. But otherwise, that’s it.

Once the competition kicks off on Thursday morning, the greens will be mowed and rolled daily. But the rough will be left to hold up on its own, standing upright astride the fairways, supplying tangled lies for errant shots and providing a key defense against the best players in the world.

The post The secret to growing mean, U.S. Open-grade rough, according to a course superintendent appeared first on Golf.

The post Justin Thomas wins WGC-Bridgestone Invitational for third victory of season appeared first on Golf.

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Sweeter than capturing his first World Golf Championship was the sight behind the 18th green Sunday.

His grandparents, Paul and Phyllis Thomas, watched him win for the first time on the PGA Tour. Paul Thomas was a career club professional and played at Firestone in the 1960 PGA Championship, missing the 54-hole cut. His son, Mike Thomas, also is a career club pro in Kentucky and a former PGA of America board member.

“I got a little choked up when I saw grandma and grandpa over there,” Thomas said. “It’s really cool. They don’t get to come out very often.”

They saw a one-man show.

Playing in the final group with Rory McIlroy, the 25-year-old Thomas made only two birdies. That was all he needed on a day when just about everyone within range was making all the mistakes.

McIlroy finished the back nine with consecutive bogeys and never recovered. Ian Poulter shot 74. Jason Day tried to make a run by making three straight birdies, only to play the final six holes in 5 over to shoot 73.

Tiger Woods, an eight-time winner at Firestone, started 11 shots behind and figured he would go out with a bang by playing aggressively. He turned in a dud, and a birdie on the 18th hole gave him another 73 to leave him 15 shots behind.

“Things could have certainly gone better,” Woods said. “But it is what it is, and on to next week.”

Thomas must feel the same way. He had gone five months since his last victory, a playoff win at the Honda Classic. While he didn’t feel as though he were playing poorly, he didn’t have the results to back it up. Now he does, and Thomas heads to St. Louis next week for the PGA Championship, where he will try to join Woods as the only players to win back-to-back in stroke play. Woods did it twice.

Thomas had not had a score better than 67, and he had not finished higher than a tie for 28th in his two previous appearances at Firestone.

“I’m glad I finally played well around here, just in time to leave,” he said.

Firestone has held tour events since the Rubber City Open in 1954. The World Series of Golf began in 1962, and it became an official PGA Tour event in 1976. In many respects, it was the precursor to the World Golf Championships by bringing in winners from around the world.

Bridgestone shifted its title sponsorship to the PGA Tour Champions, which will bring its Senior Players Championship to Firestone next year. The World Golf Championship instead will move to Memphis, Tennessee.

Thomas finished at 15-under 265 for a four-shot victory over Kyle Stanley, who got within two shots of the lead until bogeys on the 13th and 14th holes. Stanley closed with a 68.

Dustin Johnson, the world’s No. 1 player who was coming off a victory in the Canadian Open last week, started the final round 10 shots behind and shot 29 on the front nine. A birdie at No. 10 put him three shots behind, but that was all he had. Johnson bogeyed the last hole for a 64 and shared third with Thorbjorn Olesen of Denmark, who also had a 64.

U.S. Open champion Brooks Koepka had a 67 to finish fifth.

McIlroy won at Bay Hill in March and has three runner-up finishes, and he had said Saturday afternoon he was tired of finishing second. Not to worry. His 73 gave him a tie for sixth.

Thomas becomes the 21st player to win a World Golf Championship and a major, and his three victories tie him with Johnson and Bubba Watson for most on the PGA Tour this year. The ninth victory of his career moves him to No. 2 in the world, with a shot to regain the No. 1 ranking next week at the PGA Championship.

He set the tone early by hooking a pitching wedge over a steep lip in a fairway bunker to just short of the green and saving par with a 6-foot putt, then holing a 15-foot birdie putt on the par-5 second.

“It was big because I was really nervous today,” Thomas said. “It felt like it had been a while, but I guess it hadn’t really been that long. I don’t know. I was very nervous, very jittery. To make that putt on 1 and again on 2 just kind of calmed me and got me going for the day.”

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The post How low can they go? Fleetwood (63), Thomas (64) and Poulter (67) share lead at soft and gettable Firestone appeared first on Golf.

The post How low can they go? Fleetwood (63), Thomas (64) and Poulter (67) share lead at soft and gettable Firestone appeared first on Golf.

Woods might not have a choice.

Neither will Rory McIlroy, Jason Day or anyone else wanting to keep pace.

Tommy Fleetwood took advantage of another soft day of good scoring at Firestone with a 7-under 63. So did PGA champion Justin Thomas, who was particularly sharp with his putter for a 64. They shared the lead with Ian Poulter, who had a head start with his career-low 62 and backed it up decently enough Friday with a 67.

They all played early and finished at 11-under 129.

No one could catch them, mainly because there was just enough breeze to cause just enough doubt.

Even so, 45 players from the 71-man field were under par, a rarity at Firestone. Woods, whose last victory was five years ago when he won this World Golf Championship for a record eighth time, got within four shots of the lead with a tee shot to 2 feet on the par-3 12th hole. He went 1 over the rest of the way for a 68, leaving him five shots behind.

Is another Saturday move in the works.

“I’m going to have to,” Woods said. “The golf course is playing very soft, very receptive. And when you’re able to hit 5-irons and they only roll out about a foot, the guys are going to put up good scores. There’s 40-plus guys under par. That’s never the case here at Firestone. So tomorrow is going to be one of those days I’m going to have to go out there and post a low one and see what happens.”

Fleetwood, the runner-up at the U.S. Open, was most pleased to see nothing higher than 4s on his scorecard. He made it look easy, except for a few times he was slightly out of position, and hit perhaps his best shot with a 6-iron to a back-left pin that settled 3 feet below the cup.

“My irons, I just tended to hit exactly where we were picking the spots and I holed a few putts,” Fleetwood said. “You’ve got days like that where it’s going well, and you’ve just got to make the most of them.”

Day, who threw away a chance to win at Firestone two years ago, did make as many as he would have liked. He still had a 66 playing in the same group with Woods, and joined Kyle Stanley (68) two shots behind the leaders.

McIlroy was another shot behind after a finishing a day of frustration with two birdies. He was in position to make birdies, especially that 380-yard drive he launched at the 482-yard eighth hole that left him only a sand wedge in. It came up short, rolled down a slope and left him 45 feet away. He blasted a 319-yard drive down the middle at the 10th, only to hit sand wedge just over the green and made bogey.

His finish began with a tee shot on the 17th hole that landed closer to the 16th fairway. His approach went into the front bunker, and he holed out for birdie. Then, he stuffed one on the 18th for another short birdie at a 67.

“An adventure to say the least,” McIlroy said. “I was 1 under standing on the 17th tee and I think if I had to finish 1 under, it would have felt like the worst I could have shot today. So to get those two birdies on the last two holes is obviously very nice and gets a couple closer to the lead.”

Woods opened with a bogey, bounced back with three birdies over his next four holes and looked like he might make a move with his birdie on the 12th. Two holes later, he faced such an awkward lie from the top collar of a bunker that he wasn’t sure how to stand or how hard to hit it. He hit it too hard, through the green, made bogey and missed birdie chances coming in.

This is only the fourth time he has been five shots or closer going into the weekend this year, but there are plenty of others around him. Also five shots back were Jon Rahm of Spain, who had a sloppy finish for a 70, Tony Finau (68) and Players champion Webb Simpson (65).

The only regret for Thomas was a mistake that didn’t cost him as much as it could have. He was in the rough off the tee at the par-5 16th and still had some 284 yards to reach the green, with a pond in front. The distance wasn’t an issue, but Thomas said later that odds were against him making a birdie, and the safer route would have been to lay up and rely on his wedge.

He hit 3-wood too far right and into the water.

“We were lucky to get up-and-down for 6, but that was a stupid decision,” Thomas.

The rest of his game, especially with the putter, was sharp.

“It was definitely one of the better putting days I’ve had in a while,” Thomas said. “I just hit a lot of quality putts. That’s what’s most important. I’ve had days where I’ve missed more but putted better. … To me, that’s not as frustrating as what I was doing yesterday — just hitting bad putts.”

The post How low can they go? Fleetwood (63), Thomas (64) and Poulter (67) share lead at soft and gettable Firestone appeared first on Golf.

The post Tiger Woods fires 68, trails by five shots at WGC-Bridgestone Invitational halfway point appeared first on Golf.

The post Tiger Woods fires 68, trails by five shots at WGC-Bridgestone Invitational halfway point appeared first on Golf.

Tiger Woods didn’t add much to his career highlight reel at Firestone during Friday’s second round at WGC-Bridgestone Invitational, but he remains in contention to win at one of his all-time favorite courses.

Woods fired a two-under 68 on a day where he struggled to find fairways with his driver and fought through a few tricky lies and uncomfortable shots. But thanks to some deft escapes from the trees, Woods has a chance at this no-cut event, as he’s tied for 10th place, five shots back. Tommy Fleetwood shot 63, the low round of the day, and he shares the lead with Ian Poulter and Justin Thomas.

Woods of course has won eight times in his career at Firestone, tied with Bay Hill and Torrey Pines as his most successful venue. This is his first trip to Firestone since 2014, and his last PGA Tour title came at this event in 2013.

So, there are plenty of good memories. But Friday was more of a grinding-type of round that never really got going, largely because Woods hit just eight of 16 fairways.

“It’s imperative to hit the ball in the fairway here because the rough is thick, but then again if you hit the ball in the fairway you know you can flag every single iron shot. The ball’s not going to roll very far,” Woods said. “It’s imperative for me to get the ball in the fairway and go ahead and attack.”

On the 1st hole, Woods went straight into defensive mode as he missed the fairway left and had a tricky lie in the deep rough near a bunker lip. As he followed through on the shot, Woods flashed some agility (and an apparently healthy back) while hopping into the sand trap. He stuck the landing, but couldn’t salvage a par and dropped to three under.

He recovered quickly, though. On the par-5 2nd, a hole he’s eagled five times in his career, he ripped a 2-iron to the center of the green and two-putted from 44 feet for a birdie. Then he dropped a birdie putt on 3 and it looked for a moment like he might be all-system’s go for a run at the leaders (Thomas, Fleetwood and Poulter were already in the clubhouse.)

No pars on the card thru 3.

Bogey
Birdie
Birdie pic.twitter.com/fRijr2SWSU

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) August 3, 2018

Woods made another birdie on the par-3 5th when he knocked his tee shot to 12 feet and drained the putt. But wayward tee shots prevented him from sustaining any kind of run. On the 8th, Woods blocked his drive into the trees and had to rip an iron through a narrow chute. He pulled it off and saved a par.

Woods’s best shot of the day (non-escape edition) came on the tough par-3 12th, when he staked his tee shot and tapped in the birdie.

The hardest hole on the course Friday is no match for @TigerWoods.#LiveUnderPar pic.twitter.com/D0E0Xnl3LU

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) August 3, 2018

But he couldn’t keep a run going. On 13 he drove into the trees and got up-and-down to save par, but on 14 he missed another fairway, and his approach settled in the deep rough on the lip of a greenside bunker. He once again struggled with an awkward stance, never got comfortable over the shot, and chopped it through the green. It led to his second bogey of the day.

Woods had a good look at birdie on 17, but his putt hit the lip and stayed out. He two-putted for par on 18, and as players continue to fire rounds in the mid-60s, he’ll need to ramp up the pyrotechnics (and the fairways hit) to make a charge on the weekend.

“The golf course is playing very soft and very receptive. When you’re able to hit five-irons and they only roll out about a foot, the guys are going to put up good scores,” Woods said. “There are 40-plus guy that are under par, and that’s never the case here at Firestone.

“Tomorrow’s going to be a day where I have to go out and post a low one.”

Don’t forget: he’s done it here before.

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The post Ian Poulter opens with 62 to jump in front at WGC-Bridgestone appeared first on Golf.

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Tiger Woods found himself fighting his swing. He settled for a 66.

Such was the difference of two players with vastly different memories on the stout South course at Firestone.

Woods is an eight-time winner, already a PGA Tour record for most victories on one course. Back at this World Golf Championship for the first time in four years, he made a 50-foot birdie putt and two other long putts to offset some average iron play.

It was his best opening round of the year, and he needed it just to keep pace with everyone else on a soft and vulnerable course that led to 45 players in the 71-man field breaking par. The average score was 68.37, the lowest for the opening round at Firestone since it became a WGC in 1999 and the lowest for the first round of any PGA Tour event this season.

“I didn’t quite hit it as well as I wanted to,” Woods said. “But I fought out a score today, which was good.”

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Poulter is playing Firestone for the 14th time, and he came across a sheet showing his yearly results. At least he hasn’t missed the cut, mainly because there is no cut at these tournaments. He tied for 13th his first year, 10 shots behind. It never got any better.

“Yeah, it fires me up,” Poulter said after saving par from a bunker on his last hole for a bogey-free round. “It’s frustrating to look at. I actually thought I had a better finish than that, so it really annoyed me. … I wrote them all down, they were that bad. I was like, ‘Seriously, how can you play a good golf course this many times and not really have a result?’ So not to even finish in the top 10 is pretty poor.”

It’s just a start, but it was a good one.

His 62 matched the lowest first-round score at Firestone, first set by Adam Scott in 2011, and it was one off the course record for any round.

Rickie Fowler and Kyle Stanley each had a 63, while Jon Rahm, Si Woo Kim and Patrick Cantlay were another shot behind. Seven players were in the group at 65, which included Rory McIlroy, Justin Thomas and Jason Day.

Poulter missed a 10-foot putt on No. 8, his second-to-last hole. He was in no mood to quibble.

“If you would have offered me this at the start of the day, I would have snapped your arm for it,” he said. “Yeah, we can be greedy and say I’d love to have holed that putt on 8 to have tied the record. But 8 under par’s a pretty decent round for me around this golf course.”

Woods seems to put together decent scores even when he feels his game is slightly off.

“It’s nice to shoot rounds like I did at the Open and like I did today, put together rounds where I may not feel the best, but I’m able to post a score,” Woods said. “That’s how you win golf tournaments. You’re not going to have your best all four days, and it’s a matter of that bad day being 2-, 3-under par instead of being 2-, 3-over par. And then everyone has their hot days.”

Woods is coming off a tie for sixth at the British Open, where he had the lead for about 30 minutes in the middle of the final round until he fell back with a double bogey. He took a vacation in Switzerland and showed up at Firestone for nine holes of practice on Wednesday.

But he knows this course as well as anyone.

“I’ve had so many great memories here,” Woods said. “Hopefully, I can have one more.”

This is the final year for the World Golf Championship at Firestone. It moves to Memphis, Tennessee, next year.

McIlroy played in the group ahead of Woods and struggled to get the ball in play over the first half of his round. He figured it out, which he had to on a day like this.

“You can’t find this golf course any easier than we had it today,” McIlroy said. “It’s soft. It’s probably the softest I’ve ever seen it. … So you needed to take advantage of the conditions today. It looked like most of the guys have done that, which is good.”

Not all of them.

Jordan Spieth was 3 over through 14 holes until two late birdies allowed him to salvage a 71. Dustin Johnson, the world’s No. 1 player coming off his third victory this year at the Canadian Open last week, could only manage a 69. In his first start since winning the British Open, Francesco Molinari had a 70.

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The post A comprehensive history of Tiger Woods dominating at Firestone appeared first on Golf.

The post A comprehensive history of Tiger Woods dominating at Firestone appeared first on Golf.

1999

It’s the inaugural year for the World Golf Championships and the WGC-NEC Invitational comes to Firestone in August, replacing the World Series of Golf.

Winner’s check: An even, enticing $1 million.

How did Tiger do? He won. The 23-year-old World No. 1 shoots a third-round eight-under 62 and fends off a final-round 65 from Phil Mickelson in a single-shot victory at Firestone.

Must-see highlights: Come for the third-round 62 highlights, stay for the full-sized divots from a baggy-shirted Woods and a slim, trim Mickelson! Must have been plenty of rain this year.

2000

The second WGC-NEC Invitational returns to Firestone and turns into an exhibition for Woods.

Winner’s check: Still $1 million.

How did Tiger do? He won, again, shooting 64-61-67-67, tying the course record and shattering the tournament record at 11-under 259. Woods beat runners-up Justin Leonard and Phillip Price by 11 shots. What more to say? This was one of the signature tournaments of Tiger’s career.

Must-see highlights: From the “camera lens makes it look lighter than it is” files, Woods hitting it stiff at 18 in the pitch black is the perfect example of the pure joy of Woods’s dominance. It didn’t matter for the tournament— he had a 10-shot lead already — but why not add a glistening short-iron in the flash-bulbs for one final birdie? An awe-inspiring moment from the sort of tournament performance only he could provide.

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2001

Tiger-mania returns to Firestone as Woods seeks back-to-back-to-back titles in Akron.

Winner’s check: $1 million

How did Tiger do? He won — for a third straight time! — but this one took some extra work. Woods began Sunday in the final group, two shots behind Jim Furyk. Woods’s 69 and Furyk’s 71 left the pair tied at 12-under 268. After the two traded pars back-and-forth for six playoff holes, Woods stuffs a pitching wedge inside three feet at No. 18 for a kick-in birdie to seal it.

Must-see highlights: Peep that aforementioned wedge shot. At 2:45, 25 holes in, Woods smells blood and slams the door. The accompanying commentary nails it: “If you made a golf course for a golfer, Firestone is made for Tiger Woods.”

2003

After a year’s sabbatical in which the WGC-NEC heads to Sammamish, Wash., (and Woods finishes just fourth) the event returns home to Akron and Firestone.

Winner’s check: $1.05 million

How did Tiger do? He finished a disappointing fourth place, ending his undefeated streak at Firestone. Darren Clarke throws down a commanding four-shot win over Jonathan Kaye, with Davis Love III in third.

Must-see highlights: Must-see is strong, but come on down to see some vintage John Anderson SportsCenter highlights from the second round! Simpler times.

2004

Woods had hit a bit of a lull in his illustrious career, failing to record major championship wins in 2003 or 2004, and Vijay Singh loomed in his rearview, threatening to overtake the World No. 1 ranking.

Winner’s check: $1.2 million

How did Tiger do? He finished T2, four shots back of wire-to-wire winner Stewart Cink. A 68-66-70-69 Firestone week was rather pedestrian for Woods but still netted him a cool $552,000 and some solid World Ranking points. Still, Singh would claim the No. 1 spot in the next month, ending Woods’s streak at 264 weeks.

Must-see highlights: Some final-round highlights of Woods trailing the rock-solid Cink. But skip straight to 1:25 for this gem: “Gary, this is so far right Michael Moore is going to do a documentary on him.” What follows is the sort of vintage Woods mini-meltdown that reminds us just how different his on-course conduct is now.

2005

Woods arrives at Firestone once again on top of the golf world, as Masters champion and World No. 1.

Winner’s check: $1.3 million

How did Tiger do? He won again, restoring the universe to proper calibration. An unspectacular final-round 71 was good enough alongside playing partner Kenny Perry (74) and the chase pack of Stuart Appleby (74) and Paul McKinley (72). Woods shoot six-under 274 to win by one over Chris DiMarco.

Must-see highlights: Check out those Nike turtlenecks! Not to mention the stripey Sunday red. Scripting-wise, 2005 was an interesting year.

2006

Now simply the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational, but no matter. Plenty of familiar faces on the 2006 edition at Firestone, and a heck of a dramatic finish.

Winner’s check: $1.3 million

How did Tiger do? He won, once against requiring extra holes. This time his playoff opponent was ’04 champ Stewart Cink, who took Woods to the fourth extra hole before falling victim to a Tiger-Stevie double fist pump at No. 17.

Must-see highlights: “It is pouring out here.” Skip to the end to see Woods convert a buttery flop shot at 18 followed by a birdie in rain gear. In the light, the dark, the rain — there’s no stopping Woods at Firestone.

2007

Hat trick? Hat trick.

Winner’s check: $1.35 million

How did Tiger do? He won. Again. That meant his third victory in a row, his sixth at Firestone and his 14th World Golf Championship. This one was particularly notable for Woods’s final-round stomping of the rest of the field, turning a one-shot deficit into an eight-shot romp as he bettered playing partner Rory Sabbatini 65-74. Yikes.

Must-see highlights: The entire final round is is worth watching, but when was the last time we saw Tiger in that opening-round yellow? Bright and sharp. But the final-round beatdown is something to behold. “When it comes to Firestone, he now has a sixth sense,” Nantz says. Not sure about that one.

2008

No Tiger Woods! Vijay Singh wins. Let’s move on.

2009

Does it count as a four-peat if you skipped the previous year? Tiger Woods entered the week looking to find out.

Winner’s check: $1.4 million

How did Tiger do? He won. Just as in 2007, Woods entered the final round paired with the leader — this time three shots behind Padraig Harrington — and outclassed him with a Sunday 65. Harrington managed just 72 and finished T2, four shots behind Woods. Harrington, who had won two majors during Woods’s injury hiatus, saw firsthand how things looked with the world’s top player back on his game.

Must-watch highlights: Take a good look at the front-nine 30 on Sunday, and stay for the 18th-hole birdie.

2013

Let’s skip ahead a few years, shall we? Past a T78 (2010), T37 (2011) and T8 (2012). 2013 marked a return to greatness for Tiger Woods, who entered the week looking to cement his status as Player of the Year.

Winner’s check: $1.5 million

How did Tiger do? He won, and it wasn’t close. Woods was on 59 watch on Day 2 at Firestone and settled for nine-under 61, giving him a seven-shot lead heading to the weekend. He’d maintain that, ultimately posting 15-under 265, well clear of runners-up Keegan Bradley and Henrik Stenson (eight under).

Must-watch highlights: Breathe in every shot of this second-round 61, particularly the final putt. It’s the last time we’ve seen that particular version of Tiger.

The victory in 2013 remains Woods’s most recent win on Tour, and it’s no surprise that it came at Firestone. He enters this year’s event in the best form in five years, which leads to the question: What will 2018 bring?

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